Religion and Politics

Liberty Is a Slow Fruit

As the sesesquicentennial of the Emancipation Proclamation approaches, Lincoln scholar Louis P. Masur writes on its reception and history in The American Scholar. “In recent decades, a shift in scholarly focus to those outside traditional channels of power suggested that Lincoln did not free the slaves, but rather, the slaves, by running away, freed themselves. Lincoln the emancipator was reduced to Lincoln the procrastinator,” he writes. “It is lamentable that we have distanced ourselves from the proclamation and have allowed it to be diminished by criticisms of its timing, prose, and perceived efficacy.” 

Read at The American Scholar

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